


Sweet Dreams

by Hsin (amoralisch)



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Brotherly Affection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-25
Updated: 2017-03-25
Packaged: 2018-10-10 08:48:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10433946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amoralisch/pseuds/Hsin
Summary: “He won’t thank you,” he tells her. “He probably won’t even care.”– More brotherly bonding time with the Twinyards.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I really enjoy writing those two. Sadly, Aaron usually stands in Andrew's shadow and doesn't get much attention.

We share the same face, you and I, but sometimes I think that’s all we share. You’ve seen to that. Sometimes I think you can’t stand to see our faces together, side by side, reflected in a mirror. But I’m still here. You can pretend I’m not. You can look right through me –you have perfected that skill years ago. Act like you don’t hear me, like we don’t share the same room with Kevin. I’m still here. –But you are gone.

 

Aaron stands in front of the mirror, looking at himself but all he sees is Andrew. He wears Andrew’s black armbands, they were hidden under Josten’s pillow. Aaron has been looking for them, knowing Neil would have left them somewhere before his little trip. He wouldn’t carry Andrew’s knives around after all. Not many suspected it, but Aaron isn’t too shabby when it comes to lock picking. He has picked up a few things from tagging along with _the monsters,_ and even though they call him _the normal one_ , he is a monster too. The armbands feel strange on his skin. He can feel the sheaths pressed against his forearms, feels the weight of the knives they carry. They are unexpectedly heavy and almost uncomfortably tight in order to carry the weight and stay in place. ‘ _Bothersome.’_ He wouldn’t like to wear them everyday. He wonders if Andrew misses them.

‘ _Do you miss him?_ ’ Only Katelyn could ask him such a ridiculous question. He wants to laugh it off, wants to say ‘ _no, of course not, I don’t care’_ , but it would be such an obvious lie. She knows about his nightmares. Yes, he misses that bastard of a brother. He worries about his twin. Andrew will come back in less than a week. He won’t be the same. An Andrew off his meds is not the answer to any problem. It will cause probably more trouble than anyone can handle, but Aaron still thinks it is the right choice. That drug-induced mask of a knife-edge smile is too heavy to carry, and Andrew had managed to wear it for three years.

He tugs the armbands off again and notices the threadbare spots caused by constant friction. Not much longer and the sheaths’ edges will rub through the fabric. Aaron frowns down on them. He takes a moment to decide, then tugs the bands into his bag and leaves.

 

Renee is never alone but always notices when someone watches her. She meets his hazel eyes and he holds her gaze long enough for her to excuse herself from the other girls. He turns around and leaves to wait for her outside.

In the end, he gets the new bands and Renee sews the old sheaths into them for him. She does it so well that Aaron wonders if she has done it the last time for his brother too. When she is done, she smiles and hands them back to him.

“He won’t thank you,” he tells her.

“No. That makes two of us, right?” she replies and squeezes his hand for a moment before she lets go.

“He probably won’t even care,” he says. She just gives him a knowing smile that makes her face look a little mischievously. It’s cute, he thinks and hurries to look away. “Thank you,” he adds in his twin’s place.

“You are welcome.”  

 

Andrew is back and nothing has changed. The mask is gone but underneath is the same cold brother he remembers. Josten has given him back the armbands Aaron has returned to their hiding place before anyone had noticed. Andrew has not mentioned them, has not asked about the changes. He probably thinks it was Josten. Aaron doesn’t tell him, Renee doesn’t either. Chances are Andrew would get angry if he ever found out his twin had tampered with his stuff. Aaron is not a fool –but Andrew is not stupid either. He notices his brother’s eyes lingering a little too long on those black armbands when Andrew puts them back on after a shower, notices his twin’s identical eyes being drawn to the black fabric when it is showing. But Andrew says nothing.

He also doesn’t comment on the restless nights of his brother. Aaron can’t shake the nightmares that haunt him sometimes. He is glad that he usually doesn’t make a scene. His nightmares are terrible things, woven from the darkest fabric of dreams, as black as those armbands that couldn’t protect his brother that day at the Hemmick’s house. They make him twist and turn. They make him jerk awake with a gasp, and sometimes they make tears run down his cheeks afterwards, which he wipes away ashamed. But they don’t make him scream, and they are not enough to wake Kevin. Thankfully the striker could sleep through an earthquake. Andrew, though, is a light sleeper. He notices when his brother gets up in the middle of the night and leaves the room. He doesn’t ask him questions and he never follows him. He goes back to sleep and wakes again on Aaron’s return.

 

One day, he hands Aaron a folded piece of paper. Aaron takes it, a little suspiciously. It’s a literature assignment for Andrew’s German class. Andrew obviously disagrees with his teacher and has blotted out most of the text with a black marker. The assignment is on Schneider’s _Schlafes Bruder_ but Aaron cannot figure out the rest of it. He looks up at Andrew, eyebrows drawn together. His twin would not ask him to do his homework. Andrew says nothing but tugs on one of his armbands. Aaron feels a chill run down his spine and straightens. Showing weakness in front of Andrew doesn’t pay off. So he has been found out. The reaction he will get from Andrew could be anything. His twin is too unpredictable.

Aaron scans the page again, reads the remaining words between the black lines. ‘ _süße_ ’ ‘ _Träume_ ’ ‘ _Bruder_ ’ He blinks and looks up again. His twin’s eyes meet his, and Aaron feels foolishly nervous when his brother looks at him –actually looks at him– for the first time in probably years. He doesn’t know what to say. Andrew reaches out a hand and Aaron wants to take a step back but doesn’t. His twin grabs him by the hair and tousles it none too gently, before he gives Aaron a little shove and moves him out of the way. He leaves his brother behind and walks down the hall, while Aaron smoothes his hopelessly disheveled hair out of his face and glances after him. _Sweet dreams, brother._  

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading.


End file.
